Napoleon's chief surgeon invented the modern ambulance to treat soldiers directly on the battlefield.

Dominique-Jean Larrey, the chief surgeon of Napoleon Bonaparte's Grande Armée, introduced the 'ambulance volante' (flying ambulance) during the French Revolutionary Wars in 1792. Before this innovation, military regulations required that medical teams remain one league (about 4 kilometers) behind the fighting, meaning wounded soldiers often waited days for rescue. Larrey observed that speed was essential for survival and designed light, two-wheeled and four-wheeled horse-drawn carriages to navigate rough terrain quickly.During the 1797 Italian campaign, Larrey's system proved its worth by transporting wounded soldiers to field hospitals within minutes of their injuries. He established the first official triage system, which dictated that the most dangerously wounded should be treated first, regardless of their rank or nationality. This was a radical departure from the traditional practice of treating officers before common soldiers or abandoning the enemy's wounded entirely.Larrey's contributions extended beyond transport. He performed hundreds of successful amputations within the first 24 hours of injury, a practice that significantly reduced the risk of fatal infections like gangrene. By the time of the Battle of Waterloo in 1815, his organized medical corps had become a model for armies across Europe. His principles of rapid evacuation and systematic prioritization remain the core pillars of modern civilian and military emergency medical response systems worldwide.